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A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction and at such a speed. It feels an impulsion; this is the place to go now. But the sky knows the reasons and the patterns behind all clouds, and you will know, too, when you lift yourself high enough to see beyond horizons.
– Richard Bach
This is what the sky looked like on my walk on Thursday afternoon:
Every time I see a sky like this, I can’t help but think of the opening credits of The Simpsons – I call it a cartoon-blue sky.
(Why, why, why does nothing ever embed anymore, even when I put the video code in in html view? Boo.)
I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day.
– Vincent VanGogh
David called me downstairs sometime after 11 last night because he thought he saw a fox on the balcony. To be fair, he could only see the shadow of the critter’s head at first, but it was obviously not a fox on the third floor balcony, but this little guy:
He left about 10 minutes after we spotted him, shimmying down the corner pole. He didn’t seem to do much (even when we weren’t shining a spotlight on him), and I hope he doesn’t do any damage to our plants. What do raccoons eat, anyway?
* You should see the movie with this name – it is excellent, and I kind of fell in love with Richard Jenkins a little bit.
Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those whom we cannot resemble.
– Samuel Johnson
This is too wild not to share – I saw it on Sociological Images this morning and was flabbergasted. Granted, I don’t use Photoshop, but I had no idea something like this was even possible. Angela Merkel, in case you don’t know, is the Prime Minister of Germany. And if you don’t know who Paris Hilton is, then I salute you. The video is totally safe for work, by the way.
[Update: I don't know why the video won't embed -I've tried four times - but here's the YouTube link, or you can just go to the original Sociological Images post via the link above. Apparently, I'm too dumb to blog.]
Unbelieveable, right? I mean, the hair at the end is a bit off, but the rest is dead on. And I laughed so much at the constant orang-ing of the skin needed to go from “Prime Minister” to “celebutante” in under 4 minutes.
If we could all hear one another’s prayers, God might be relieved of some of his burdens.
– Ashleigh Brilliant
So sorry for the lack of posting this past week. Moving and then Comcast screw ups left me without internet until Tuesday night. But here are some things I’m grateful for:
1. Aimee, my oldest and best friend, whose optimism and hopefulness never ceases to inspire me, and whose family could really use any good thoughts and prayers you could send right about now.
2. Being slow to get started on something you’ve been putting off, but once you get started, feeling like you’re on a roll and not wanting to stop.
3. Angel, by Jimi Hendrix:
What about you?
Every time we walk along a beach, some ancient urge disturbs us, so that we find ourselves shedding shoes and garments or scavenging among seaweed and whitened timbers like the homesick refugees of a long war.
— Loren Eiseley
So, I’m back. I had such a great time that I nearly stayed another day, but one thing was pulling me home, and I know I made the right choice. But here is a photo essay of my trip, with a little commentary along the way:
This was the house Aimee’s family is renting for the week – it’s 9 bedrooms and 5 (I think) bathrooms, with a hot tub, a cabana, a big deck on the top, and this beautiful pool:
Saturday we moved our stuff in and immediately headed for the pool, playing with Ben and the other kids. We later dried off and showered, and we were getting ready to go out, when our plans were thwarted because there was no one to watch Ben. So we hung out at the house instead, and I had my first drink of the weekend, which is my new favorite thing:
Here we are on the patio:
Aimee went to bed around 10:30, and I walked across the street to the beach in the dark. I sat down on the sand and stared at the stars and listened to the waves crashing and felt, suddenly, very small. Which was good, because this thing that’s going on that I’m not really talking about feels very big to me and it’s hard sometimes to remember that this is not all there is. I crawled in to bed a little after midnight, tired but happy to be where I was.
Sunday morning, Aimee was up with Ben by 6:15, and she woke me because she knew I wanted to see the sunrise, and I was glad she did.
I went for a little barefoot run on the beach, which was awesome, and then took a nap til about 9. We spent the day at the beach and the pool, and then went down to Beach Street that night to walk around like tourists.
We went to a mirror maze, where they made us wear plastic gloves on our hands so we wouldn’t leave fingerprints on the glass and give away which ones were mirrors. We had a blast – we went through three times, and laughed our asses off the whole time. Here we are in the maze, and we both think we’re looking at the camera:
We walked down to the Boardwalk for a little bit and watched the lightning flash over the ocean, which was very cool. Then we headed to a bar where Aimee ordered a margarita as big as her head and I had something called a Moon Doggie, which was spiced rum, blue curacao, and strawberries in a frozen concoction, and it was yummy.
We headed home exhausted, and I was up again for the sunrise on Monday, although a little later. I saw pelicans dive bombing for their breakfasts, a dead horseshoe crab, some jellyfish, leftover sand castles, and much more.
Then Ben and I hung out for a little bit:
Then I headed to the beach to lay out. I was lying on my stomach, and I lifted my head up for some reason, and all of a sudden, it was like Night of the Living Dead – all the little sand crabs peeked their heads up out of their holes and started skittering around. It was so weird, like the sand was moving. As soon as I reached for my camera, they all darted back underground. Eventually, I was able to capture this little guy on video:
Then, I saw about a million dolphins about 150 yards off shore.
I stood hip-deep in the ocean with tears streaming down my face watching them surface and jump. I probably could have swam out to them, that’s how close they were. And I would have, if I thought they would have let me get close. I like to think that the dolphins would know it was me if I went to them.
After that, I went to the pool for a bit and then showered and got ready to go. We took a few final pictures:
And then I was off. It took me less time to get from the beach back to Northern Virginia than it did to get from Richmond to the beach, which it shouldn’t have, but that’s beach traffic for you. When I got home, I unpacked, and I think Pico wants to make sure I don’t leave without him next time:
A catcher and his body are like the outlaw and his horse: He’s got to ride that nag til he drops.
– Johnny Bench
Because it means Braves games aren’t on TBS every ten seconds, and since I don’t live in Atlanta, I don’t get to see many games on TV anymore, which means I missed this on Thursday night:
That is, as you may have realized, my baseball boyfriend Brian McCann, legging out his first major league triple. I must have watched it 15 times already, and I still laugh every time. That’s some funny stuff. The article that led me to search for footage of it began this way:
Chipper Jones had another birthday to remember, right down to teammate Brian McCann’s belly flop of a slide.
So it turns out that Chipper, in his major league career, is batting .500 on his birthday, which I think is kind of cool. As you can see in the video, Chipper got a kick out of Brian’s baserunning:
Jones nearly buckled over in the dugout, laughing at McCann’s inelegant work on the basepaths.
“That was just pure poetry in motion,” Jones said, still chuckling about it in the clubhouse. “That’s pretty much how Pete Rose used to draw it up.”
Later, the article cracked me up:
McCann’s triple was his first since he had two for Double-A Mississippi in 2005.
“There’s no cameras?” he said after arriving at his locker. “I may never get another triple in my life, so I’m excited.”
Is your base-running underrated?
“No,” McCann replied. “I’m as slow as it looks.”
Yeah, that about sums it up. Catchers are generally the slowest runners on a baseball team, and Brian is, I would wager, one of the slower catchers in the league. I didn’t realize that he’d never hit a triple in the majors before, though.
My favorite part of the video, besides the actual slide and Chipper cracking up, is that you can see the third base coach take a knee to tell Brian to slide, but you also see that the second baseman cuts off the throw from right field and never even makes an attempt to throw to third, and the third baseman isn’t anywhere near the bag looking for a throw. The play was never going to be close, so the slide was entirely unnecessary. That’s kind of a mean trick to play on a guy!
Courage is the discovery that you may not win, and trying when you know you can lose.
– Tom Krause
Ok, if Marlee Matlin can dance on TV in front of millions of people, surely I can sing karaoke in a bar in front of 30 drunk people, right? (Which would, hopefully, be a prelude to something more official and public.)
In all seriousness, I’ve never watched much of Dancing With the Stars, and I forgot to watch last night, even though I meant to, but I saw this video today, and it actually brought tears to my eyes. I was so proud of her.
And leaving aside the deafness issue, how hot does she look? She’s in her 40s and has 4 kids; I’m 31 and childless, and I wouldn’t look half that good in that dress. Good for her!
Art is not the application of a canon of beauty, but what the instinct and the brain can conceive beyond any canon. When we love a woman, we don’t start measuring her limbs.
– Pablo Picasso
This is gorgeous – a video of women depicted in Western Art in which each painting or portrait morphs into the next. There are some that are very familiar to me, but many more that I’m sure I’ve never seen before. I think it’s beautifully done and worth three minutes of your time. It ends on Picasso’s “Francoise,” which I only recently discovered (through my grandmother, who sent me a Smithsonian article about it with a notation at the top: “She reminds me of you; think it’s the eyes.”), but love immensely (Picasso is by far my favorite artist). Enjoy!
There is nothing in which people more betray their character than in what they laugh at.
– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
My grandmother sent me this video this afternoon. The title is Best First Dance at a Wedding Ever, and I have to agree. Apparently this is the hot video at the moment, because I that hear the couple is going to be on Ellen. Given her penchant for dancing, that doesn’t surprise me at all.
Watching this video makes me hopeful for this couple’s marriage, actually – they seem really at ease with each other and obviously have a great sense of humor about themselves (how many brides have you known who would freak out at the idea of such foolishness on “the most important day” of their lives?). I hope it brightens your day just a little bit!
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